A flare stack (sometimes called a gas flare or a flare) is an upwardly directed duct, open at its top end, for disposing of unwanted gases released from a facility, such as petrochemical plant, oil and gas processing fields, and/or other facilities. The released gases can be both flammable and environmentally damaging. To prevent and/or minimize the gases from escaping into the atmosphere, the gases can be burned before they are discharged near the top end of the flare stack. A pilot burner is located near the top of the flare stack, to ignite the released gases.
An entity may want to determine that gases are being properly burned by the flare stack. In some instances, a government entity (e.g., Environmental Protection Agency) can mandate that an entity monitor the combustion process and ensure that gases released into the atmosphere are at an admissible level. To ensure that the gases are being burned and not released into the atmosphere as an environmentally damaging gas, the flare stack can be monitored to detect when the flare stack is burning gases (e.g., by identifying a flame near the top of the flare stack).
One flare stack monitoring method is visual based inspection. Another method is based on optical camera monitoring. Both require manual operation by a trained operator. Further, an image captured by an optical camera (e.g., a red green blue image) cannot capture images of the flare stack at night and/or at degraded weather conditions.